The Left Fork
by VerminLord666
Summary: My Fanfic starts with Todd and Viola fleeing Farbranch  in Book One . They run to the fork in the road and instead of choosing the right fork  as they do in the book , they choose the left. The beginning of my story is the work of Ness to set the scene.
1. The Left Fork

**NOTE: The following paragraph is ****NOT MY WORK****. It belongs to the author of the trilogy Chaos Walking, Patrick Ness. My FanFic begins after "I ain't what you call a lucky person."**

**NOTE: Any misspelled word is intentional. (Obviously.)**

Maybe our story will turn out differently if we take the left fork, maybe the bad things that are waiting to happen to us won't happen, maybe there's happiness at the end of the left fork and warm places with the people who love us and no Noise but no silence neither and there's plenty of food and no one dies and no one dies and no one never never dies.

Maybe.

But I doubt it.

I ain't what you call a lucky person.

"Left," I decide. "Might as well be left."

Viola and me race down the left fork with Manchee panting along at our heels. Viola don't say nothing about what's undoubtedly all over my Noise, about the slaughter we just witnessed in Farbranch, about the army, a real honest-to-goodness army, chasing me and Viola thru hell and creashun, about Ben and Cillian—

Who ain't in the army.

Who weren't marching into Farbranch with the rest of Prentisstown—

(the _whole effing town_)

Who weren't shooting at the backs of everything in their paths—

(like Mr. Hammar)

Again, I'm stuck wondering whether or not this is a good or bad thing. I wonder what I would rather see: Ben shooting at the kids of Farbranch (the same ones I just saw poking their noses into the barn I was sweeping not two hours ago. Has it only been two hours?), or Ben dead back at my farm? I can't bring myself to answer, cuz what's the answer?

(what?)

We're running by the light of Viola's flashlight as more darkness creeps over the forest, the only sound my Noise and Manchee's Noise and the soft Noise of the night creachers in the woods. And Viola's quiet, which is still the loudest of them all. So quiet and secretive and it still makes me uncomfortable not knowing what she's thinking, still not knowing for sure that she's even thinking _anything _up there at all (even tho she says she is)—

And I push the thought back and do my best to cover it up with the rest of my Noise, even tho I know it's too late and she's already heard it, but she don't make no sign of noticing and just keeps on running, her arms pumping hard at her sides.

After a while, she stops and bends at the waist, putting her hands on her knees and breathing heavily.

"We can't stop here," I say. "The army'll be done with Farbranch and'll already be back on the road." But I'm bending over, too.

"We need water, Todd," she gasps. "We can't keep going without water."

I frown and put my hands on my hips impayshuntly. "Any ideas?" I snap.

"Todd—" she pants, then says it again, "Todd."

"There ain't no water cuz we stopped following the river, so we'll just need to deal with it till we find some," I say.

"Stupid," she mutters, shaking her head. "So stupid." And I know she means about taking the left fork and not the right.

"I know," I agree, making my voice to get gentler. "We'll find some water, tho, we will." We _will_. "But in the mean time, the army's getting closer and we have to keep going." At the menshun of the army, Viola viszually shudders and straightens up.

"Army!" Manchee barks.

Moments later, we're racing down the road again, trying our best not to think about the lack of water at hand. Well, at least I am. I still don't know about her.

The next hours that pass are the same as the first, running and running and running and not stopping for nothing. Finally, Viola slows to a stop, putting her hands on her knees like before, but this time, I don't urge us on. We take in huge, raking gasps of air that are painful to listen to and stay like that for a while, just breathing and catching our breath. I lick my dry lips and glance down at Manchee, whose sides are heaving. "Good boy," I gasp, patting his head, tho I don't know why I'm saying it.

"Manchee!" he barks and buries his nose into my hand.

"Maybe we should stop for the night," Viola suggests beside me.

"Here? We ain't sheltered and anyone can see us!" I protest.

"We'll move to the underbrush and hide till morning. But we need to rest, Todd," she says. "Especially since we don't have water." Reluktantly, I make my way into the woods and scoot under a bush that's close to the path but not too close. Viola crawls in next to me and Manchee curls up just outside, licking fiercely at his tail. As I close my eyes, I think I hear Noise drifting from outside the bush we're hiding under, but it must be the night creachers' Noise, cuz it don't sound like no man's Noise.

I shrug it off and the next thing I know, I'm dreaming that I'm racing thru the swamp in slow motion, trying to get away from the crocs that keep leaping out of the water at me and I'm swinging my knife at 'em all but they just keep coming and then their heads start to change into Aaron's head and the Mayor's head and Mr. Hammar's head and then Viola's standing right next to me, hissing "The book, Todd, I can read it to you!" and I'm swinging my knife at the crocs and I finally manage to slice at Mr. Hammar and his head goes flying off, but suddenly it ain't his head no more cuz it's Ben's and I've killed him cuz it's Ben it's Ben it's Ben and—

"NO!" I shout, sitting bolt upright and knocking my head into the branches above me. Viola grumbles something next to me and I push my way out from the cover of the bush, stumbling over Manchee. The sun is starting to creep up above the horizon and the Noise I heard last night is still there. But as I listen carefully—

I realize it ain't creachers Noise.

It's mostly just pictures of things, of trees and fish and there's a picture of me standing outside the bush, my eyes wide and my hair a bird's nest. Slowly, I reach down and pick up Viola's flashlight, cuz even tho the sun's rising it's still too dark to see. I straighten up and click the flashlight on—

Shining the light right into the faces of the waking Spackle camp.


	2. The Truth of a Lie

I freeze, not knowing what to do.

What _do _I do?

Everything I've known—

Everything I've _thought_ I've known—

Has all been a lie.

The Spackle ain't supposed to be alive.

They all died in the war—

Every last one of 'em.

And yet…

And yet here they are—

At least a dozen of 'em—

All with their too-high mouths and floppy ears and pale skin and long limbs and black eyes—

And even tho I ain't never seen a Spack in the flesh—

Even tho—

I know.

I know that right here and now—

These are Spackle—

Stopping their work and turning round to stare right at me.

Me and my wide eyes and bird-nest hair that's reflected all over their picture-Noise.

I duck down under the bush again, even tho it's clear I've already been seen. "Viola!" I hiss and shake her arm urgently.

"What's the matter, Todd?" she mumbles, her words slurring together as she tries to pull away.

"Viola, wake up!" I shake her again, harder this time.

"Viola!" Manchee barks from outside the bush, awake and excited from the panic in my Noise and the Spackle and he's jumping around barking "Spackle! Spackle! Viola! Spack! Todd!" and I reach over and clamp my hand around his snout. "'w, Tdd?"

"Quiet, Manchee!" I hiss and turn back to Viola, who's already sitting up as far as the branches will let her.

"What's going on, Todd?" she asks. "What's he talking about?" But I'm already opening up my Noise and showing her what I saw and I can tell she's already hearing the Spackle' Noise and she's crawling out from the bush, pushing past me and I'm following her and she's grabbing up our bags as I stand, drawing my knife from its sheath. The Spackle are still staring, some have picked up some spears that look more like hunting tools than anything else, but the spears are down by their sides and they ain't doing nothing else.

Just staring.

What a strange reaction for such violent creachers.

I swallow hard and open my mouth to say something (tho I don't know what), but nothing comes out. I swallow again and wave the knife in front of me, its blade glinting in the pre-dawn light. "Stay back," I warn as Viola pops up beside me.

"Back," Manchee growls and I can see the hair along his back is ridge up. _Good dog._

"I ain't afraid to hurt you," I say, but I know I don't sound very convincing since I can hear my own fear rising in my voice like bile. "I ain't scared to use this, so just stay back." But along with the fear rising in my voice, I can also hear anger, too. Anger at being scared (shut up), anger at being stupid enough to have made camp right at the edge of a Spackle camp (shut _up_), anger at being lied to about all the Spackle being dead, anger at who I'm facing for what they've done.

Cuz I'm facing the very creachers who started the war in the first place.

I'm facing the creachers who released the Noise germ on us.

I'm facing the creachers who killed my ma.

I can feel the fear sink back into me as my anger keeps getting stronger and stronger, my Noise getting redder and redder. And no way am I leaving here without a fight.

No way am I leaving without making the Spackle pay for what they did.

I guess Viola is reading my Noise, cuz she's pulling on my knife arm and urging, "Let's _go_, Todd." But I ain't listening to her and I'm pulling away from her and my Noise is rearing up, all red and fiery and angry, all traces of fear gone (_good_), and Manchee's hopping around my feet, getting all charged up, barking barks that don't say nothing more than "Bark" and I'm swinging the knife over my head and I'm yelling and I barely even notice that the armed Spacks are raising their spears and the defenseless ones are all skittering back and Viola's screaming my name behind me and I'm about to charge I'm about to charge I'm about to charge when—

A flash of Noise passes in front of me, a picture. It's a picture and it's of—

It's of—

Oh no—

Oh God, _no_—

It's of the Spackle walking thru a forest full of tress, wading thru a swamp—

Not just _a_ swamp—

_The _swamp—

The one by my farm—

The one in Prentisstown—

Except there ain't no houses as far as the eye can see. No gas stayshuns, no churches, no farms, no bars, no Prentisstown. Just the swamp and the Spackle wading thru it with spears which I guess are for fishing.

And I realize—

I realize that this is before I was even born, before the settlers even came.

Which don't make no sense, cuz there's Noise coming from the Spackle. The same kinda picture-Noise I'm hearing and seeing now, but still Noise. Which _really _don't make no sense, cuz how can there be Noise if there ain't been no war to release the Noise germ yet?

And then—

Then it _does _make sense.

It makes _perfect _sense!

It makes too much sense and I don't wanna see no more, but I keep watching, and as I'm watching, it starts to make even more sense. Cuz the Spackle never _did _release the Noise germ in the war, did they? The germ had been on New World the entire time, way before the settlers even got here. Viola's people are gonna meet the same fate as the old settlers that came, but not because of any war. Not because of any war _at all_. None of the settlers were affected by a germ released in war, but by a natural germ that has been on the planet forever!

I stop breathing, cuz if the Noise germ affected the men right away, then it must've affected the women right way, too. But it didn't.

It _didn't_—

Not if my ma had the time to write that journal.

So something else musta killed the women—

Something not the Spackle—

But what?

I stare at the Spackle in front of me, the one sending me the pictures of the swamp, the only unarmed one who didn't scurry away from me and my knife. I lower my knife slowly, but I'm whispering, "Yer lying." He takes a step back and the picture recedes, "That ain't true," I say softly, but course it's true. _Course _it is. Cuz every truth I learned from Prentisstown turned out to be a lie, didn't it? Cuz ain't the Spackle all sposed to be dead? And what other truth is there to believe now? What reason do the Spackle have to lie to me?

Course the Spackle're telling the truth.

_Course _they are.

I drop the knife to my side, too shocked to do or say nothing.

Another picture is pushed to the front of the Spackle's Noise, a picture of scrawny me and scrawny Viola and our parched mouths and a Spackle edges toward us from behind the one talking to us (if you can call it talking) and she's carrying a plate of fish and a bowl of water and I realize she's _offering _it to us.

I turn a little to Viola, who's mirroring the same look of shock that's on my face (according to the Spackle's picture-Noise). She shrugs a little and we both turn back to the Spackle, who've laid their offerings out in front of us and are starting to bow.


	3. The Plot of the Land

I take a quick step back as their long fingers brush the ground in front of me. "Todd? Todd?" Manchee asks, less certain of how feroshus he should be acting now. The Spackle who explained New World's history to me lifts his head to us and starts talking with his Noise.

_The girl_, he shows. _The girl from another world._

I glance at Viola and she shrugs. "Yeah," I say to the Spack. "That's her."

He glances at Viola and I find myself edging between the two protectively, like I did with Mathew Lyle back when we first arrived in Farbranch. Mathew Lyle, who I may or may not have—

Well anyway.

"No, Todd," Viola protests softly, brushing me out of the way a little. Then, addressing the Spackle, she asks, "How did you know that?" and I realize I'd never even thought of that.

The Spackle lowers his head as he's addressed by Viola and shows, _The boy thinks it._ I prickle at being read so close by a Spack and am about to protest when Viola shushes me with a wave of her hand. "So what about me not being from here?" she presses the Spackle.

He glances up again and even tho I ain't an expert on reading Spackle expreshuns, I think I can definitely see his eyes glinting with urgency. _Your people are coming_, he shows Viola and she nods, cuz she already knows that, don't she? _When they arrive, you mustn't let them help the tyrant, no matter how forceful or persuasive he may be. When they come, you must help the Land defeat the Clearing. The Land is not advanced enough to defeat them alone, but your people might help us. _

I frown and turn to Viola. "What's he talking about?" I snap impayshuntly. "What's the Land and the Clearing and who's this tyrant?"

The Spackle don't seem to remember that I'm there, and he's doing a fine job ignoring me, too. Which is really starting to piss me off. My Noise begins to rise, cuz even Viola's ignoring me as she asks the Spackle what I _just asked her_. "Who's the Clearing?" Except no, she's saying it like the Clearing is a who, not a what. Weird.

_**His **__kind,_ the Spackle shows, throwing me a glare, and if you can spit Noise, that's what he just did.

I raise my knife. "You got something to say?"

Viola waves her hand at me and says, "Not now, Todd." And she says it so firm, I find myself lowering the knife a little. But just a little. "What do you mean, '_his _kind'?" she asks the Spack.

_The Clearing_, he shows. _They started the war with the Land. They think it is over, but the Land is not through with them yet. This war is not yet won. _Viola swallows and looks at me.

"I guess the war's not over for them," she murmurs.

"If they want, we can finish it now," I snarl, shrugging my shoulders and raising the knife again.

The Spackle hisses, revealing a set of razor-sharp teeth, and some of the Spacks behind him raise their spears. _I am not going to waste time killing a pup when there is the rest of the Clearing's army to fight._

"Stop, Todd!" Viola gasps and steps between me and the Spack. "Can't you go two seconds without raising that stupid knife? Just drop it, will you?" and it's something in the fierceness of her voice that makes me drop it completely to my side, feeling stung like she just effing _slapped _me.

"I ain't in the army," I say to the Spackle weakly. "And don't call me a pup. Cuz I ain't."

Viola throws me one last disdainful glare before turning back to the Spackle. "Let me make this clear," she says in a low voice. "No matter what happens, Todd is with me, and if _anyone _of you hurts him, my people and I won't be helping you at all."

The Spackle bows down even farther to Viola, showing, _As you wish_. And I can't help it, but I do feel a little surprised at Viola's threat to the Spackle, especially after how she just spoke to me. My Noise turns yellow with embarrassment and I do my best to rustle it up with red hostility toward the Spackle. "But," Viola adds, turning to me. "If he hurts any of you, my people and I will be helping you in a second." I can feel my face fall and my Noise go flat as she narrows her eyes at me.

But before I can say anything, the Spackle with the food and water holds up her offerings again, distracting us from the potenshul fight. "Well, we might as well eat something," Viola reasons.

"Yeah," I grumble. "Whatever."

The Spacks feed us raw fish (which is more disgusting than I care to admit) and water—cold, too-sweet water that kind of bubbles uncomfortably on my tongue. Viola says it reminds her of something they had on her ship called tonik water, or something. I don't know what that is, and I don't like the taste of the water, but water is water and we gotta drink something, if we wanna survive. As we eat, the Spackle watch us with wide-eyed intensity, like they're just waiting to eat us.

The lead Spackle explains to us that this group of Spacks is called the Burden. In the war, when the Land (which I guess is the sposed to be the Spackle) lost, the men, or Clearing, as they say, kept some Spackle as slaves. The slaves became a burden to the Land, and so the name stuck, I guess. Some of the Burden escaped and are communicating with the rest of the Land, plotting how to rescue the remaining enslaved Spackle and finish the war.

And as I listen, I feel like a traitor, cuz—

Can I say? As I listen, I can't help but feel bad for the Burden. I mean, they were torn from their families and from everything they loved and they were abused and enslaved and starved and maybe even killed and—

Well, I'm starting to feel bad. And ashamed, too, cuz men did this to them, and I _am _gonna be a man in—

Well, I ain't so eager to be a man no more.

And the more I feel bad for the Spackle, the more I feel like a traitor to the men, the humans, the Clearing, Prentisstown—

No. they lied to me and betrayed me and they killed Ben and Cillian and they _slaughtered _all those innocent people in Farbranch and I do not—_do not_—feel ashamed to hate them for what they've done.

Viola gets to her feet beside me, wiping her mouth on her sleeve. I stand up quickly and Manchee turns away from the baby Spackle he was playing with. "Leaving, Todd?" he asks.

"Yep," I say. "C'mon, buddy." Reluktantly, he trots over to me, looking back at the babies as much as he can.

"Babies, Todd!" he barks.

"You'll seem 'em later," I lie, and he wags his tail happily, cuz what reason does he got not to believe me?

"Thank-you for the food and water," Viola says to the Spackle as they get to their feet, too. "But we're running from the army and so we have to get going.

_Army!_ The Spackle shows in disgust and lets out a hiss. He rears up to his full height and shows, _Let them come. We will kill them all._

"They've got guns," Viola points out.

_We have weapons. _

"Hunting tools," I snort.

_We will fight._

"They'll kill you."

_Not if __**you**__ fight with____us._

Viola gasps. "We can't stay here! They'll kill you faster!"

"And then they'll take us, anyway," I add.

_We will protect you_, the Spackle shows.

And Viola and me say "You can't!" at the same time, but it ain't funny like it used to be. "We need to go," Viola says quickly, slinging her rucksack over her shoulder. "They'll be catching up and we need to—" She stops short as we all turn our heads toward the road, cuz there it is, ain't it?

_Thump-budda-thump-budda—_

Coming fast up the road—

_Thump-budda-thump-budda-THUMP!_

And just like that, it's time to go.


	4. Hoping Without Hope

"Army! Coming! Go!" Manchee barks.

Viola turns urgently back to the Spackle, who are ushering their babies back into the trees and grabbing up spears to arm themselves. "We need to go," she repeats, and this time, the Spackle don't argue.

The lead Spack points his long finger away from the road and shows, _If you head that way, the trees become more dense, and you will soon find a pond. Follow the streams coming out of the pond and you will be lead back toward the road. _Another Spackle throws him a spear and he catches it, turning away from us as—

_Thump-budda-THUMP!_

"Let's go, Todd!" Viola urges and we race away from the Spackle camp, Manchee barking up a storm at our heels.

_BUDDA-THUMP-BUDDA—_

I hear men shouting behind me and I know the Spackle camp was found, and I can hear the Spackles' picture-Noise roaring loudly and violently behind me, showing pictures of their spears piercing right thru the Prentisstown men's throats, their eyes, their heads, pictures of the Spackle stabbing the men over and over and over again. And then I see the pictures in the men's Noise, shooting it right back at the Spackle, showing 'em pictures of the Spackle on their knees, begging for mercy, the Spackle getting shot twixt the eyes, lying on the ground with millions of bullet holes piercing their bodies, their blood spilling everywhere, pictures of the Spackle babies being torn from their arms and slaughtered and this battle of pictures has got to be worse than any fought war.

And then I hear it—

A sound that rips thru the air so loud and awful, it rattles you right down to yer core—

The first gunshot.

I stop and whip around and I think of the Spackle with their simple hunting spears up against an army of men each armed with a rifle and I know—

It's effing _obvious—_

That no matter how fierce the Spackle were, they ain't winning this fight. Not by a long shot.

"Todd!" Viola hisses and I scramble after her, trying to block out the sounds of the gunshots and shouting men but mostly the screaming Spackle as the die die die. "Don't think about it," Viola says, matching my steps.

I clench my teeth, but not cuz she's reading me so close. It's just the thought, the thought that the Spackle are getting slaughtered cuz of _us_, and here we are, fleeing like a coupla useless effing _cowards_.

_I am Todd Hewitt and I am a coward. Turn yer effing behind around and _help those Spackle!

_Coward coward coward, _my footsteps thump as they pound the ground.

But there ain't nothing for it cuz we need to get away and the army'll be coming and there ain't nothing—_nothing—_we can do, and that just makes our entire situayshun so much worse, don't it?

"Just concentrate…on running," Viola pants and so I don't think about nothing, just focus on the trees ahead and the pond we're sposed to get to and the city, Haven, that will solve all our problems.

Which is just as doubtful as the left fork being the paradise I hoped it might be.

And that just proves that hoping don't get you nowhere, does it?

(trees, pond, Haven)

But even as I'm trying my hardest to concentrate on those three, I can't help noticing my mouth getting parched and I'm starting to shiver a little, something Ben taught me is a symptom of dehydrayshun. Which really don't make no sense at all, cuz didn't I just drink some water back at the Spackle camp? I know it wasn't a lot, but it was enough to hydrate me, right? Another chill races up my spine and my legs start to feel weak, which Ben says is another way to tell if yer dehydrated or not. Something he called fateeg. I slow to a stop, breathing heavy and sweating even tho I'm freezing cold. "Todd," Viola says in front of me, noticing that I've stopped. "Come on, we're almost there. You can make it, let's go." I put my hands on my knees and stare at the ground, trying to catch my breath and doing my best to not fall over. "Todd?" I hear Viola call.

"In a sec," I pant. "Just gimme a sec…" I shiver again as more sweat pours down my face, dripping off the end of my nose. I try to straighten up but collapse to my knees instead. It takes a few more tries with the help of Viola pulling at my arm but finally I'm up and staggering after Viola and a barking Manchee.

And suddenly, Viola stops short. "Todd, listen," she says, and I stop, too. And I listen. And even tho we're too far away to hear anymore, all my brain is letting me hear is the gunshots in the distance, killing and killing and killing—

And there—

Just _there—_

The sound of waves gently lapping the shore of—

Of a pond.

It's gotta be.

"C'mon," she says and we race toward the sound.

And we've found it—water. So I guess we won't be dying of dehydrayshun after all. And maybe—just maybe—

(don't think it)

Maybe there _is _hope.

(shut up shut up shut _up_)

"Hope! Hope! Hope!" Manchee yowls and shoots past us, disappearing behind more trees. Viola pushes ahead a little, too. She's ruddy fast, you know.

I hear splashing and happy yapping sounds and I break thru the trees right behind Viola and she falls to her knees at the water's edge, scooping up handfuls of water and gulping them down and I wade in after Manchee and I dunk my head under the water and gulp in as much of the stuff as my mouth and throat will let me and I ain't even bothering to check for Noise or water creachers or nothing, which is a mistake, cuz all of a sudden, I hear, "Young Todd?"

I freeze and turn around slowly, cuz now I can hear it, can't I? Noise that's saying, _**The Holy Sacrifice **_and _**God hears **_and _**young Todd **_and _**If one of us falls, we all fall**_ and I turn and look straight up into the torn face of Aaron—

And all the hope inside of me vanishes.


End file.
